I am building a convection water cooling system (a little like the "Innovatek HTCS Passive Radiator" ) and wanted to know about pump head, or the distance a pump can push water straight up.

Below is a bad representation of my design. Each line represents a heat sink tower with with a hole for the water running up the middle. The water comes in at the bottom of the longest pipe and goes up, and then goes down the next pipe, and so on, until it finally goes down the smallest pipe. Just picture lots of U joints at the top and bottom of the pipes.

|
| |
| | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
Up the first pipe, down the second pipe, up the third pipe, down the last pipe.

If the tallest pipe is 24 inches does that mean my "pump head" is only 24 inches? Gravity should force water right through the system because each pipe is smaller than the last. So although it is having to travel up the pipes several times I figure we discount all but the first trip up because of gravity assist. Am I right or wrong about that?

If you have a pump that can push 2 feet of head it will get to the top of the rad. But you will need more then that because the more tubing the more head you will need, because the more tubing you have the more restricted the system gets. Also the more head the better it will give the system a better flow rate (but if your using Innovatek blocks then they're designed for slow flow so you would just need to get any sort of pump). Also just out of curoisity why are you using a passive radiator? You can get a heater core or black ice and the would perform much better.

Quote: Originally Posted by samualt I am building a convection water cooling system (a little like the "Innovatek HTCS Passive Radiator" ) and wanted to know about pump head, or the distance a pump can push water straight up. Below is a bad representation of my design. Each line represents a heat sink tower with with a hole for the water running up the middle. The water comes in at the bottom of the longest pipe and goes up, and then goes down the next pipe, and so on, until it finally goes down the smallest pipe. Just picture lots of U joints at the top and bottom of the pipes. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Up the first pipe, down the second pipe, up the third pipe, down the last pipe. If the tallest pipe is 24 inches does that mean my "pump head" is only 24 inches? Gravity should force water right through the system because each pipe is smaller than the last. So although it is having to travel up the pipes several times I figure we discount all but the first trip up because of gravity assist. Am I right or wrong about that?

You are partially right. The tallest point in your radiator would equal the head required for it. IF...you have absolutely no restriction to flow. Of course you do have restrictions and changes in direction that will lower your flow/head. Generally more head is better, but you will hit a wall of diminishing returns soon after 300 g.ph. and 10-11 ft. of head. Past that the pump needs much more electricity to operate and dumps more heat into the loop and you'll see no improvement over smaller pumps. The electricity roughly doubles for every additional 100 g.p.h. While a large radiator and fan can easily cope with strong pumps, a passive one may not.

I'd say avoid impingement based blocks like WhiteWater's and RBX/TDX, and stay with just enough pump for the job in a passive system. Probably 150-200 gph @ 4-5 ft. of head.

I myself like a lot of HEAD, it just seems I never get enough HEAD and I just always look for more.

SPECIALBLEND218:
I thought of getting a regular radiator ,like a chevy heater core, but I think that would look ugly. Although I have heard it would work extremely well. The Black Ice is too small for me. I want extreme cooling not just good cooling. And I want it to be very quite and cheap. I currently have a Kannie Hedghog heatsink (massive copper finned block) with two 8000 rpm fans on it and it screams! It sounds like your sitting on a jet plane right next to the engines...only louder!

So, I already have these T-Slots (1"x3") aluminum beams which are used for constructing machines and such. Each beam has these two small 1/4"+ holes running the length of them so I could use both holes for a nice 1/2" throughway on each beam. They would make extremely good heat sinks! I can cut these beams to length so I thought I'd make a neat looking passive heat sink that uses convection. I'm thinking about using 15 feet of the stuff, LOL. That ought to give some cooling. And it wouldn't need a fan, although I will probably mount one in the bottom just to see if there is much difference. The whole thing would weigh-in at about 35 lbs so it's not exactly mobile, but not too bad to move around. It has the added benifit of looking more like art than a big nasty radiator (i.e. flaunt it, don't hide it.)

In other words....It's just a big dumb idea I had and since I already have most of the materials for it why not try it.

Quote: Originally Posted by ducati748r I myself like a lot of HEAD, it just seems I never get enough HEAD and I just always look for more.

HAHAHA Funniest thing I have heard in a while



Also here is a heater core that I really like:
http://www.moddershq.com/product.asp?idval=5

Or you can pick up that core from autozone and mod it yourself to make it look good. The only problem I find is how large the convection rad will be to work properly. But then again 15 feet should be enough (now you have to find some where for it ).

Attached Thumbnails

 

Quote: Originally Posted by ducati748r I myself like a lot of HEAD, it just seems I never get enough HEAD and I just always look for more.

Agreed ducati. Never enough. Except in the case of beer, then theres always too much (except for my guinness).